Write, Read, and Write

  

If you’re sad or glad,
feeling good or bad,
on days when rain falls
or the skies are dry,
pick up a book and read,
or write—on Word,
or on paper,
let your thoughts take flight.

Write poems that rhyme,
or let them wander free
in the quiet spaces
of open verse.
Write stories that last
a thousand pages,
or capture a lifetime
in a flash of words.
There are no rules
for every thought to follow—
only the courage
to let it out, let it flow.

It may not be very good;
it may stumble, falter,
lose its way—
but write it anyway.
Struggle through the words
as you would through life,
and give your thoughts
the freedom to survive.

Share them with writers,
share them with readers;
let words find words,
and minds find minds.
No gate-crasher here,
no intruder near—
just thoughts that connect
and words that we see and hear.

It’s a better way
to spend your precious years,
even the unproductive ones,
than becoming a puppet
dangling helplessly
from the strings
of social-networking monsters.

The Illusion of Permanence

What lies beyond life
is death.

Yet the depth of this certainty
is quietly ignored.

What defies inevitable decay
is the yearning to be immortal—
through writing,
through creating wealth,
through procreation,
through leaving something
of ourselves.

But why at all?

If everyone dies,
then what remains
of all we build,
all we create,
all we accomplish?

Perhaps life lies
somewhere between
the utility of living
and the futility of being

a façade of meaning
we build against
the certainty of nothingness. 

The Roof

You deprived me of
wealth, intelligence,
recognition—
you, my gathered
destination of faith,
my organisation of work,
of strengths and debilities.

I had my family beside me;
you took that away too.

My only resource left
was my health.

Then, one by one,
my organs sang in chorus:
damaged, defective—
we give in.

And then, all of a sudden,
despite the failing body,
complete loneliness
you came unto me,
wholeheartedly.

I had never been
so full,
so adequate,
so content.

What a wonder
to discover the light
in you,
the glow of happiness,
the quiet yearning
to want nothing more.

The roof that was never
there in the room
sheltered me now—
not from the storm,
but with calmness,
with respite,
with the strange peace
of finally needing nothing.

Tue Reckoning

No matter what harm you do
to others,
The sky will not come
crashing down
On the failing crown,
Hey, brothers.

Laughable rhymes may
overlook unforgivable crimes,
And death, in time, may
balance inevitable birth.

The circle of life moves on,
indifferent,
While the tolerant earth
silently bears
The good, the wicked,
the just, the cruel—
And leaves the
reckoning to death.

Words And Feelings

Words rehearse
Produce a prose
Or a verse…

Feelings come and go
Without a halt, with a flow…

Words and feelings hardly meet
A compromised text is somehow built.

Naming the feelings is always a sin
Letters can't capture what's heard and seen.

The air swims, the light glows
The flowers written off as lotus and rose. 

Feelings More Than Words

I wish I could love like you.
You have space for enemies and friends.
You accommodate the materialists,
the saints of all times, places, and ages,
much the same.

Full of love, therefore,
you are free from all bondage.

The more I choose, the more I lose.
I stretch my arms without an alarm.
Words may harm, feelings can charm.

Seven Days, Somehow

 

Monday murmurs, meekly moans
Tedious Tuesday tortures more
Wednesday whines, wails,
withers a day
Tricky Thursday ticks, trots time away
Friday freshens up a little bit
Saturday and Sunday swiftly perish.

I stay in the days that
let me freely flow
I sail through the weeks
that weakly come and go. 

A Snowfall

Snowfall a white night
Silence shouts on the lone streets
Spring whispers off stage 

A waterfall

 

The only rule
is to fall,
but with focus, with
full concentration
the act of falling
is not of failure, it
rises as a spectacle,
a joy for all, forever. 

The Uncaptured Ecstasy

It's hidden
deep inside—
a forgotten switch,
a potential to light a shady space,
a soft note, in between
the Do and a Do, that triggers
the hardness away,
the aura that intellects cannot see,
the love in every mom's recipe
that's there, not there, but certainly there.

It's hidden forever—
the uncaptured ecstasy

From the East

This is my property,
fully clad, completely covered.
The treasure travels from the kitchen
to the places of worship, to the bed.
No school can touch it.
No education can pollute it.
Stories from it, though, can be read.

Tired of writing about the hunted,
the poet puts down his pen.
The eyes are weary of seeing
the sun rise in the East;
the poems, exhausted, watch
the glowing star disappear
into the West.

---

De l’Est

C’est mon patrimoine,
entièrement vêtu, entièrement recouvert.
Le trésor voyage de la cuisine
aux lieux de culte, jusqu’au lit.
Aucune école ne peut l’atteindre.
Aucune éducation ne peut le lire.
Pourtant, on peut en lire les histoires.
Fatigué d’écrire sur les traqués,
le poète pose sa plume.
Les yeux sont las de voir
le soleil se lever à l’Est ;
les poèmes, épuisés, regardent
l’astre flamboyant disparaître
à l’Ouest.

The Infinite Within

The world lies hypnotised by petitesse,
blind to the vastness of the infinite.
The real self, nameless and unconfined,
hides beneath the walls of flesh and mind.

We chase what fades,
mistaking possession for fulfilment,
while eternity waits
in the silence between words, confinement.

And perhaps lasting happiness
is not found in what lives and dies,
it is seldom in any form
it is open, hardly in any disguise.

Punishment Is a Blessing in Disguise

I spent my whole life
learning this:

your punishment
was a blessing in disguise.

Drowned beneath
the weight of my desires,
I thought you had deprived me—
yet you kept me alive.

I came seeking refuge
at your threshold,
and you turned me away.

Only later, looking back,
did I see the gifts
you had left in my hands:

light,
air,
water,
fire,
and the tolerant blue sky—
the elements
from which I am made.

Every time I came seeking you,
you rejected me.

Every time
I returned empty-handed,
I returned stronger.

I stood at the threshold
and turned away
when I should have crossed the door.

I did not know
that every refusal
was teaching me
to enter myself.

Day after day,
you led me deeper
into the relentless
examination of my own soul.

Sometimes I forget you.
Sometimes I remember
and try to follow your path.

Yet your cruelty
knows no bounds.

You disappear
behind the mask of appearance,
and even that absence
becomes a blessing.

Perhaps this is your kindness:

you reject me
because you are preparing me
to be taken.

You withhold yourself
until I am ready
to receive you.

And perhaps,
on that final day,
when everything I thought I knew
falls silent,

I will see the truth—

not with my eyes,

but with something
that has been learning
to see all along.

 

The Beast Is Not an Animal

The beast is not an animal.

It has no claws,
no fangs,
no forest to hide in;
it comes in open arms.

It sits in rooms
where the fate of our only home
is decided,
wearing a mask for a reason,
signing papers
that turns forests into trees and woods;
and oceans into borders.

Look at what it has brought us—

wars,
fires,
floods,
silent rivers,
empty nests;
and skies that remember
the colour of smoke.

Too many disasters
to count.

And yet
the beast is invited
to place its cards on the table;
where tomorrow is decided.

Perhaps that is what makes it a beast—
not that it destroys,
but that it knows
what it is destroying;
and continues.

Somewhere,
far beyond its reach;
a poet sits.

No weapon.
No throne.
No power to command;
All as its own.

Only words.

He writes of the beast
with metaphors,
with broken images,
with lines that refuse to sleep.

Perhaps the beast
will never read the poem.

Perhaps it will laugh.

But the poet keeps writing—

because sometimes
the first act of resistance
is to give a monster
its true name.

Flame

Flame, you efface the sacrifice
of flora and fauna
laid upon winter’s table—
the fever of the clean hand
that touches what it cannot save.

Flame,
so the white clouds
cannot wipe away the tears
of our silent cries,
you rise through the air
like a memory refusing to disappear.

I lean towards you.
I genuflect before the grief,
the solitude gathered in your smoke.
There, in your trembling light,
I search for the face
I have forgotten how to forget.

I lean towards you again.
I take your face into my hands.
How beautiful it is
to lie upon our deserted bed,
the bed that was ours
years ago—
when the walls still knew our voices
and the night had not yet learned
to sleep alone.

Flame,
from the other quarter of the room,
our house looks like
the prow of a passing boat—
already leaving,
already carrying away
everything we were.

And the broken glass of the mirror
lies scattered in the abandoned kitchen,
each shard holding a fragment of fire,
each fragment
like a piece of burnt toast
left behind
by a morning
no one came back to finish.

 

Wake up, Dawn

Wake up, Dawn!
When will you wake up
from this daily ritual
of waking up—
this monotonous morning,
this mundane beginning
that promises a new day
but brings back the same old night?

Dawn,
with your trembling tears of dew,
you look upon the world
and what do you see?
Burnt homes, broken borders,
voices drowned in hatred,
hands raised against hands
with excuses that go beyond
all bounds,
people divided by walls
they keep building
inside their hearts.

The night could not ask for more.
Darkness has learnt
to survive the sunrise.
Even when the horizon glows,
shadows stretch longer,
hiding beneath the light.

From the depths of despair,
a thin streak of light appears—
frail, almost extinguished,
struggling  against the dark,
as though the morning itself
has forgotten the way to us.

Where are you, Dawn?

Every day you arrive,
yet I cannot find you.
You paint the sky with gold
while the earth remains bruised.
You scatter light across windows
that open upon sorrow.

Stop playing hide and seek, Dawn.
We have searched for you
through wars and wounds,
through smoke-filled streets,
through the cries of the displaced,
through the silence of those
who have forgotten how to care.

The fires may have faded;
the flames may have died,
but their colours still haunt the sky—
red with anger,
black with grief,
orange with memories
that refuse to burn away.

And the nightmares
have risen from their beds.
They walk among us in daylight,
wearing familiar faces,
speaking familiar words,
turning fear into habit
and hatred into routine.

Wake up, Dawn!
It is about time you woke up.

Not merely to wake the birds,
not merely to open the flowers,
not merely to colour the sky—

Wake up
to awaken us.

Wake up the kindness
we have buried beneath our pride.
Wake up the humanity
we have silenced with hatred.
Wake up the hope
we have taught ourselves to fear.

For what is the use of another sunrise
if the world remains asleep?

Wake up, Dawn.

It is time
to wake up.

in the loop

 

loo
in the air
forests on fire

still

It's-lovely-the-sun-has-come-out
travels in the minds of people not
willing to break the ice
pages burn with the sun
the frigid snow doesn't stand a chance

two tribes are at war
the world weeps, wails, warns
but...like the loo
it cannot stop

Enough

 

I haven't heard the word in so long,
Neither in cash nor in kind;
It lingers in our language,
Yet nowhere in the mind.

I wonder what has become of the world.
The word still lives upon the tongue—
Only its meaning has departed,
Its quiet wisdom left unsung.

No limits, no borders, no boundaries;
No ceiling for our wants.
A craving divorced from every need,
Greed gallops beyond all restraint.

Until we learn to say, "Enough,"
No treasure fills the empty soul;
The richest hands remain outstretched,
Begging perpetually for the elusive whole.